


And You Want to Travel Blind

by angelfeast (miscellanium)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Agender Angels, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Croatoan/Endverse, Angel & Vessel Interactions, Canon-Typical Violence, Casual Sex, Consent Issues, Drug Addiction, Drug Use, Falling Castiel, Graceless Castiel, Jimmy Novak Big Bang Challenge, Loss of Grace, Lucifer Possessing Sam Winchester, Minor Character Death, Minor Original Character(s), Multi, Sharing a Body, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Vessel Consent Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-20
Updated: 2017-03-20
Packaged: 2018-10-01 17:02:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10194506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miscellanium/pseuds/angelfeast
Summary: The second time Jimmy Novak woke up he couldn't stop crying.[After the end of season 5 Sam comes back with Lucifer along for the ride. Dean tries to keep the situation under control, but when Castiel returns it all starts falling apart. A year of carrying himself carefully turns into two, and the apocalypse drags on.]





	

**Author's Note:**

> most of this was written in 2011 for the jimmy big bang but i had to withdraw for personal reasons. i always wanted to complete it but never could bring myself to do so until now. here you go.
> 
> title from and story heavily inspired by leonard cohen's "suzanne".

**14 May 2010**

The second time he woke up he couldn't stop crying. He didn't try to get up. He had no reason to move because he had nowhere to go. He could still feel the burn and tear where grace had forced its way through, sure that there were scars, eternal like everything else he had never planned to be. Castiel would come back, always come back—

"It's over," the angel said, leaning over him and still wearing his face and none of this made sense, so he turned and pressed his face into the grass, tried to remember his daughter's eyes, feeling each blade and wondering why he couldn't stop breathing.

"We have been brought back. You are free to make your own choices now." Castiel sounded almost serene, full of faith redefined. Jimmy wanted to punch ou in the face.

"Go away." His voice was a rasp, hoarse not from crying, no, but from years of the angel not really fitting right. He could still remember the acid burn of the first time Castiel tried to speak through him.

Jimmy didn't have to open his eyes to know that Castiel's looked at him in that scrutinizing way of ou's and vanished. When the warmth of daylight faded he rolled over onto his back again and thought about getting up.  
He was still wearing his suit—for some reason he had half-expected to be naked—so he undid his tie, stuffed it into his pocket, and took off his jacket and balled it up, carrying it under one arm as he started slowly walking toward the glow of city lights at the forest's edge.

 

**30 May 2010**

Dean was in Lisa's garage when it happened. He was checking his tools for the next day's job—some roofing gig, nothing exciting—when there was a clatter outside, too loud and heavy for it to have been an animal. He glanced at the clock—almost midnight. Heart pounding, he moved around the tarp-covered car, fumbling with the lock of the trunk as footsteps started approaching. By the time the garage door started rattling open of its own accord, Dean had the sawed-off shotgun ready and loaded—rock salt, but there were real ones nearby if he needed them.

"Dean?"

He didn't relax, but it was hard not to when it was Sam standing there, Sam who was supposed to be dead, his _brother_ —

"Sam?"

"It's me, Dean. I don't know how, but..." Sam stepped forward, into the garage, eyes worried and arms held awkwardly like he wasn't sure what to do with them, and it was this last detail that made Dean lower the gun.

Then he walked under a lamp and the bulb shattered. They both looked up instinctively, and when they made eye contact again Dean couldn't keep the horror off his face. Sam raised his hands.

"I'm telling you, it's me, don't—"

Dean fired.

Both rounds hit Sam in the center of his chest with a dull thudding noise, a small spatter of blood. Cold, sluggish, and not enough for a human. Dean immediately started reloading, but he couldn't help but pause at the sound of Sam saying his name.

"Dean, _please_. I might be different, but it's still me in here," pleaded Sam. Dean chambered the bullets and raised the gun again.

They stared at each other for a few seconds, then when Dean took his finger off the trigger a smirk spread across Sam's face.

"Well, he was half right."

"What?"

"He's here, but you know how it is when people share. They like to take turns," Sam said, amused disdain twisting his voice.

"Lucifer." Dean didn't move.

"In the flesh," said Sam's voice, Sam's face. "Oh, sorry. Is that a bad joke?"

Dean wanted to cry but it seemed redundant. "Give him back."

As if cut from strings Sam stumbled, falling into Dean's arms. Dean dropped the gun and just held him tight as he began to sob, mumbling "I'm sorry" over and over.

 

**1 June 2010**

Jimmy spent his first two days in Detroit living in a hotel room, watching the river and not the street with all those people who didn't know and couldn't know, paying for room service with the cash Castiel had left in his pockets. He was afraid to use his credit cards in case Amelia had canceled them, as people do when somebody dies—but he wouldn't let himself think about that, just cut them up and threw them away.

On the third day he went out, went shopping for new clothes and picked up a newspaper. The date across the top told him that it had been a bit more than a year since the last time Castiel left him.

He started collecting different newspapers, three or four a day, taking out the classifieds and circling possible jobs. By the end of the first week it started seeming like a good idea to put in an application for at least a few, but Castiel had come back so suddenly last time. He couldn't forget Amelia's hesitant first touch, her hands hovering in the air.

Midway through the second week Jimmy finally rented an apartment, if only to stop the pitying looks from the hotel workers. He found one in Illinois, which was probably a bad decision but he knew the state and wanted to go home.

He moved in thinking he'd make a new start, get a job. The newspapers piled up and he took to hanging out on the fire escape to escape the small dark room.

And then one day he saw her. Older, of course, hair a little darker and clothes a bit less plain, but definitely still her. Still Claire. He stood, leaned over the railing to get a better look. She was walking down the sidewalk, talking and laughing with a group of friends, but even though he couldn't really see her face or understand what she was saying it was easy for him to imagine a note of sadness in everything she did.

As she moved on he leaned farther out, trying to keep her in his sight as the rusty metal pressed into his belly. He felt like he could lean this way forever.

Then the railing creaked, began to give way, and he leapt back. When he approached the edge again, heart pounding, Claire was gone. For a while he just stood there, trying to steady his breathing, grinding the heels of his palms against his eyes in an effort to fight off the stabbing pain of another headache. He'd been having so many ever since—

"Jimmy."

No. He lived alone. The voice—his voice, he refused to think—had come from behind him, but he lived alone, hadn't been praying for anybody to come—

"Jimmy." Closer now, though there had been no footsteps. The wind was picking up, carrying the voice with it. "I need you."

Jimmy folded his arms against the sudden cold, cheap hoodie scant protection. "You said it was over."

A pause. "I was wrong," the wind said.

There's no good answer to this. "Give me one good reason why I should say yes again, let you fuck up my life again." He wasn't going to think about how his life was already fucked, just let his anger carry him through—

"You need me." Castiel doesn't give him a chance. "You've been praying for me. For my return. You're lost without me."

"Shut up!" Jimmy went inside, slammed the door, but that didn't stop the wind. No, it followed him—gust after gust rattled what little furniture there was, sent newspapers flying around the room, and Castiel wouldn't stop talking.

"There is nothing left for you here. You're only causing yourself pain. If you continue on this path you'll do the same to your wife and daughter. Do you really want to know how they are living now? What good would that do?"

Jimmy felt like he should be dropping to his knees but really he was too weak to move, standing with his back to one door and staring at the other.

"I don't know, okay? I don't know," he said, hating himself for sounding so scared.

"I need you," Castiel said again, so close now, whispering into his ear and filling the room at the same time.

"Can you," said Jimmy as he swallowed, breathing in raggedly. "Can you at least tell me why? And I mean a straight answer, none of the 'you have a purpose' crap you gave me the first time."

"Lucifer walks the earth again." There was no thunder, no sudden dark sky, just silence.

Jimmy closed his eyes. Thought of the brief glimpse of Claire he'd had, her laughter and friends. Thought of Amelia possessed, shooting him in the stomach and leaving him to die.

 

**10 June 2010**

It was five in the morning when Dean's cellphone rang. His first thought was Cas, but Cas had left after the Apocalypse That Wasn't and as he woke up he remembered Sam. After Sam had come back, sharing his body with the devil, they had decided to split for their own safety but keep tabs on each other. This meant that more often than not Dean would get calls at odd hours thanks to the magic of time zones, not because of other possible reasons he didn't want to think about.

"Yeah, what is it?"

At first there was just crackling on the other end, then there was a low laugh. Really, Dean knew he should hang up like he usually did when this happened, but sometimes he couldn't help it, not when Sam was still in there.

"You want to know what we did tonight?" Lucifer asked and there was something wet about ou's voice, like Sam's mouth was full of something.

"You mean what _you_ did, and no." He was about to close the phone when he heard a swallow and then Sam's voice came through again, soft and hesitant and _fuck_.

"D-Dean? I don't think this is working," said Sam, and he sounded so lost Dean couldn't think of anything to say.

 

**15 June 2010**

"Dean."

It was like Castiel had never been gone, deep voice casual and close behind him like the angel had just been out for a few minutes.

Dean turned, clenched his hand, hit the wall behind Castiel's head.

"Son of a bitch, don't _do_ that!" His phone was on the floor, dropped at the sound of fluttering wings.

Castiel didn't bother trying to parse; ou understood everything Dean meant.

"Lucifer is back, Dean."

"Oh, thanks, Captain Obvious." He laid the sarcasm on heavily, helplessly. "I wasn't sure, what with him walking around in my fucking _brother_!"

Castiel nodded.

And maybe Dean had been barely holding himself together if that alone was enough to make him come apart.

"You knew. You knew, and you didn't come sooner." He swallowed, turning away.

"I couldn't. I had to find my vessel and then track you—"

"You know what? Fuck you." The words spilled out, hot and irrational, but Dean didn't care. "Fuck you and the cloud you rode in on. That was supposed to be the end, supposed to end it all." _What happened?_ hung in the back of his throat like something that wanted to crawl out and die.

Castiel shrugged and oh that was just _it_. Dean reared back for another punch, aiming for the face this time and fuck everything else, and suddenly he found himself pinned down on the motel bed by the angel's horribly strong and gentle hands.

"Dean." Castiel was kneeling above him, expression inscrutable, and all Dean could think of was how he wanted to hurt that cold body. "If I could have come sooner, I would have. We all did what we thought was best." Ou paused, eyes widening like way back then at their first meeting. The memory almost seemed like someone else's. "There's no reason for you to blame yourself."

 

**3 July 2010**

"Did you know this was going to happen?" Dean's voice was flat and his eyes hard. Castiel stood beside him, staring into the house as if looking for guidance there.

"Know what?" Chuck shifted nervously, as though he thought that was the wrong answer but it was the only one he had.

Dean and Castiel exchanged a look, then Dean pushed his way past Chuck and into the living room, sitting heavily on the couch covered with dirty laundry and empty beer cans.

"Sam said yes."

"W-well, right, so he could go into the Pit and stop the Apocalypse—"

"Lucifer escaped somehow." Castiel stood in the middle of the room, still looking around. "Sam carried him for a month intending to trap him again, but Lucifer wore him down. "

Dean was silent at this, hands in his lap and eyes down. At a loss for what to say, Chuck glanced at Castiel and was met with an even gaze that betrayed nothing.

"I don't get visions any more," Chuck blurted out.

"I thought so," murmured Castiel at the same time Dean said "You're kidding me, right?"

"They stopped a month ago, after—I mean, um. I saw what happened at Stull Cemetery," Chuck said carefully, watching Dean. When it didn't look like any furniture was in danger, he continued. "Then the next day, Raphael, he—well, he didn't talk to me, exactly, but he basically said goodbye. And then...they all left."

"Not all of us," Castiel said. "Most." Ou sounded unsure, but nobody felt like pressing ou.

"So what do we do now?" asked Dean with a sigh, rubbing at his eyes.

"Peace or freedom!" Chuck yelped into the silence, excited like he'd just remembered something important. "Castiel said after, uh, after the cemetery, I wrote it up, it's here somewhere." He ran to his computer desk, started pawing through stacks of paper. "Here, 'just more of the same' he said. So, I guess—"

"That was then." Castiel's words were measured, emotionless. "This is now."

Dean snorted and got to his feet. "Well, this has been really helpful. Thanks for that deep insight, Cas. You too, Chuck, but I think we'll be going now."

Castiel stayed behind, staring just over the former prophet's head until the door slammed and the loud noise prompted ou to meet Chuck's eyes. Yet there was no fear there, no worry, just the resignation of somebody who could still guess what was coming. Chuck opened his mouth then, but Castiel had nothing to say to him so ou turned and followed Dean outside.

In the Impala Dean just sat for a while, hands on the steering wheel and Castiel silent in the passenger seat. Then Chuck's door banged open and the sound of running made him look up.

"Hi, um, sorry," Chuck said breathlessly. "Can I come with you guys? What with Lucifer and—I'm not much of a hunter myself, you know." He started to laugh nervously, visibly stopping himself.

Dean stared at him. After a sidelong glance at Castiel, he shrugged. "Sure, why not? After all, it _is_ the end of the world."

Chuck opened a side door, then hesitated. "Really? I mean, we don't exactly have the best history together."

"Look, if we're all gonna die, may as well take you with us." Dean winced as soon as the last word left his mouth, the joke too revealing for comfort. But this time Chuck had the grace to stay silent, just got in and clicked a seat belt across his chest.

 

**28 July 2010**

“Dean. Dean. Wake up.” He opened his eyes to see Castiel bent over his hotel bed. “Your phone's been ringing all night.”

Eyeing Castiel with suspicion, Dean groggily reached for his phone. “I didn't hear it.”

Wordlessly, Castiel kicked a few beer bottles away from the bed. Dean scowled at him and opened up his voicemail.

The call history was all one number.

Hours and hours of the same message. _I'm sorry, Dean_. Castiel gently took the phone from his shaking hands. Across the room, Chuck sat up in his bed and rubbed at his eyes. 

“Was that—”

“Not now, Chuck!”

Sam, worn down by years and months of self-sacrifice, had said yes.

 

**15 August 2010**

Dean's phone had gone dead after July, so when it started ringing again he didn't tell Castiel, just picked up and held his breath.

"Dean? Dean, are you there?"

The voice was right but everything about this was screaming _wrong_ yet he couldn't bring himself to hang up.

"Maybe. Who's this?"

"Oh, come on. You mean to tell me you don't recognize your own brother's voice? That was quick." The words came soft and seductive and this was not Sam.

In the morning he held the phone out to Castiel, who took it without a word and crushed it, plastic shell cracking bit by bit in the angel's hand.

The calls started coming regularly a week later.

 

**25 April 2011**

Jimmy opened his eyes to darkness. A dream, he thought. Then there was a rumble and the pins-and-needles static electricity came flooding back and he _remembered_. Another rumble, this one deep enough it made his teeth hurt— _his_ teeth, physical and real—and the flash of light was Castiel opening his eyes. Something had distracted the angel, something big, but all Jimmy could see was a knife and blood and he couldn't close his own eyes.  
Then there was shouting coming from everywhere and he was thrown across the room, his left arm— _their_ left arm—cracking on impact. Castiel got up, unfazed, and at the sight of his bent forearm with bones poking through Jimmy wished he had the control to throw up.

But Castiel was already advancing under the smoke of gunfire, broken arm held against ou's body, and then ou leapt high, coming down hard sword-first on the back of something—a white-hot pain was all Jimmy could feel before he, blessedly, passed out.

 

**27 April 2011**

"It's not much, I know, but..." Chuck trailed off as Castiel stared down at him. "Um, it should hold well enough, I guess." The sling was made out of the remains of some curtains Chuck had salvaged, the blue paisley pattern somehow managing to be both flashy and a match for Castiel's eyes.

"Now you really do look like a nerd." Dean said, leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed.

Castiel frowned, the sling bright in the left field of ou's vision. "My arm should have healed by now." There was no confusion in ou's voice, just frustration and hurt.

"Well, I've got painkillers in my bag, but—" Dean stopped, raised an eyebrow.

Castiel said nothing, looked at ou's broken arm and tried to ignore Jimmy urging ou to take it it'll help what are you waiting for. Finally, ou raised his good hand and ran it through ou's unwashed hair. "Let's give it another day or two."

Chuck got to his feet, pulling Dean aside. "I remember seeing something like this—I mean, from before—don't let him—"

"From before, huh? Well, things are different now," Dean said, voice casual as he pushed Chuck off him roughly. "So don't tell me about what you've seen."

 

**5 May 2011**

On nights when Dean was feeling particularly drunk and maudlin he'd say that it was Bobby who founded the camp, God rest his soul. Then he'd laugh and flip off the sky, because God? Yeah right.

So, the camp was Bobby's idea. People were starting to flee rural parts of the country, flocking to major cities because they thought that whatever was out there couldn't get them where things were civilized. The ones who stayed behind banded together, and as Dean and Castiel picked up followers it became harder and harder to just roam around.  


One day Dean handed a stack of folded and worn maps to Castiel, told ou to start looking for a good strategic place.

"Start driving," Castiel said.

Dean took a meandering route south then east, going from back roads to empty highways as Castiel stared out the window with directions to everywhere spread out across ou's lap.

"Take this off-ramp."

They rolled through the now mostly-deserted fringes of Jamestown, New York, and when a campsite came into view Dean stopped the car.

"This looks good," said Dean, leaning on the steering wheel and looking around for a sign. "Does the map say what it's called?"

Castiel didn't need to look. "It's part of a Chautauqua. The first and the oldest one still operating. " Dean glanced over, quirked an eyebrow. "That was still operating," ou amended.

"All right." Dean clapped Castiel on the back carefully, like there was a crack running through ou's center. "I'm gonna go check it out."

Castiel stayed in the car, running his free hand over the creases of the maps and trying to feel ou's bones knitting themselves back together. Dean wasn't gone long, sliding back in with a grin on his face.

"This, whatever you said, Chitaqua—great job, Cas."

Castiel found ouself smiling all the way back to Bobby's. It almost didn't matter that Jimmy was awake again, and that ou couldn't put him back under anymore.

When they got back to Singer Salvage, not everybody wanted to make the commitment. The three other humans left in the Midwest got into one of the less decrepit vans and came down from South Dakota for a verdict. They liked it well enough to slap together a sign on the spot, and had Dean take a picture in an effort to try and make a home out of the place.

His finger on the button, Dean thought of another photo he'd seen—but Castiel still had the coat on here. There was still time for things to turn out differently.

Then Bobby came up with a mild frown on his face. "We should get some of the demonology stuff out before we just abandon my house."

"And you didn't think to mention that earlier?" But Dean's eyes were bright enough, and it didn't take long for the two of them to get back into the van. "You come too, Cas, and bring the maps."

There was no lingering over scenery this time, only an effort to get there as quickly as possible by ways they hadn't gone before in case something decided to follow them.

"Stay here, all right? If it turns out that there's something you can carry, we'll come get you." Dean's smile was thin, and Castiel didn't bother to reply.

Castiel spent the next fifteen minutes looking at the landscape covered in junked cars, trying to convince ouself that ou could still read the history of things. Then somebody knocked on ou's window.

"This is Bobby Singer's place, right? Dean inside?"

The man was an average white guy (brown hair, middle-aged) but Castiel could almost see something ugly in his eyes. After a few long seconds the man chuckled, the sound coming in sharp bursts.

"Sammy says hello." He raised his shotgun in a careless salute before letting himself into the house.

Castiel sat there, unsure whether this was some new breed of demon or just one of the damned, while Jimmy said least do _something_ , it doesn't matter what, but it did matter because maybe the man could still be saved—then there was a shout, a crashing noise.

After that everything was quiet, just wind hissing through the grass and broken windows, until Dean kicked the door open, clothes bloody and knuckles bruised. By the time they crossed the border back into New York it had been night for many miles and he still hadn't said anything.

 

**16 May 2011**

Castiel spent three weeks insisting that ou's arm was healing through grace, however slowly. Then, after the night ou got trapped outside the camp gates by a demon-possessed bear, barely able to hold it off until Dean followed the shouting and blew off its legs with the grenade launcher, ou stopped talking about it. Ou never said that ou had been wrong or lying or anything, just took the pill bottles from Dean without a word.

Jimmy kept telling ou that it's not lying if you don't know the truth, but that didn't get him anything more than closed doors, condemned houses. His dreamscape, the false Illinois Castiel had created for him, frayed more with every pill the angel swallowed, but he was never going back there anyway so what did he care? The slow grind of bone against bone was closer. The painkillers barely took the edge off, if at all, but Jimmy noticed that ou was only taking the standard dosage and really that was just silly.

"Go back to sleep," Castiel told him.

"Dean told you to take the whole bottle, didn't he? Makes sense, 'cause your—being an angel makes my body process things differently, so why don't you?" They shared minds, angel consciousness threaded throughout the folds of his brain, so of course Castiel understood the last minute substitution, went deathly still.

"You don't want to admit you don't really have it anymore, is that it?" pressed Jimmy; it was a bad idea, yeah, but was there anything better to do? He was trapped in his own body with an angel who wouldn't acknowledge what was happening, the world was falling apart, this wasn't what he had signed up for way back when, and he just wanted it to be over.

"Look," Jimmy tried again, pushing at the cold edges, the rotting picket fence that marked the divide between them. "Look, stuff like this, and this kind is seriously heavy-duty, it's supposed to deaden your senses. So it'll help with the pain and I'm thinking maybe it'll help you, I don't know, be able to ignore me. Help us ignore each other."

Castiel didn't say anything to this, just rolled the orange bottle around in ou's hands and listened to the pills rattle.

 

**5 July 2011**

The fireworks display was made of road flares, shot high until they were lost among the white needles of the out-of-season meteor shower, the sky falling. Chuck was given charge of the barbeque, turning freezer-burnt meat into charcoal and giving people more of an excuse to get drunk. Castiel started slurring ou's words too soon, fewer bottles at ou's feet than Dean would like. But by then it was past midnight and everybody else in bed, leaving just them and the lingering smell of something burning.

"I have something to tell you, Dean." Castiel was sitting splay-legged on the ground, gazing intensely at the almost-empty beer bottle ou held in loose hands, and it was too easy for Dean to see just another drunkard, hair and tie messed up and no way to get home.

"Let's get you inside first. Getting cold."

Castiel finished the beer, drawing the last drops off the lip with wet licking sounds, then drew ouself to ou's feet and stood there wavering. It looked as though Castiel's next step would just slide away, pull ou back down, so Dean took hold of ou's shoulder and walked with ou to ou's cabin. Somewhere between the grass and the bed Castiel had started talking, but the words had been lost under one boot in front of the other. Then there was Sam's name, round and smooth, and god it'd been so long since he'd heard that said aloud. And, right, Castiel was saying something.

"Wait, I didn't get that."

"I raised him."

And just like that, something gave way. A year of carrying himself carefully, not letting himself bang into those memories, gone. He hadn't come very far if that's all it took to tear him down again, so he put a hand on the doorframe, blanked his mind.

"And Lucifer?"

"That was a mistake," Castiel said, mouth twisting and eyes nearly impossible to see in the dim room.

"A mistake." Dean wanted to stop, just walk away, but they had torn up the ending and now they had to keep going whether they wanted to or not.

Castiel shrugged. "You try telling their souls apart." That's the alcohol talking, Dean told himself, but then Castiel raised ou's arms and stretched again, the popping sound too close to breaking. "My painkiller ration." It was less of a question than a command, and Dean just looked at this thing in front of him, sitting on a sagging bed in somebody else's clothes. 

"How could you not have noticed?"

Castiel stared at him for a long while, as though ou could still see his face against the darkness. "Your brother is an abomination, Dean. It's just a fact."

"Right. Okay. Just like you're a failure. Here's your fucking pills." Dean slammed them down on the dresser and stormed out. After a moment Castiel lay down, closed ou's eyes, and tried to go to sleep despite the rattle of Jimmy's laughter, rising sick and hysterical.

 

**28 July 2011**

Painkillers were a poor substitute for grace. There was nothing ineffable about a plastic bottle. The pills numbed Jimmy's nerves, quieted their complaining skin, but added nothing to his perception. With nothing else to do, Jimmy was more than happy to tell the angel about psychedelics. _They sound close enough_ , he said. They didn't but the pills couldn't smooth the ragged ache of a fragmented identity. Without grace, what was left? 

 

 **3 August 2011**

Castiel felt like ou was floating. _Flying_ , Jimmy said, and he was wrong but the man's pleasure was infectious and Castiel wanted to forget. So when the bowl was handed back to him, ou took a few deep pulls before passing it on again.

"How you doing?" One of the new guys, sitting at the other end of the small circle, was watching ou.

"I'm beginning to feel something."

He wasn't bad-looking, Castiel observed, unshaven with short dark blond hair, blue eyes and a full lower lip that put him somewhere between rat-like and devilishly charming. Mark, that was his name. Jimmy laughed, started singing a nursery rhyme about the four apostles. Castiel ignored him.

"Oh, good. I was worried that, I don't know, since you're an angel it wouldn't work, and Dean's been saying—" Mark stopped, empty grin hiding his embarrassment. "I am so high right now, man."

Suddenly Castiel was _angry_. There was so much for ou to be angry about, so many people and brothers who deserved his wrath, and ou had fallen so far and could do _nothing_ —

"Relax, Cas, relax, or it's going to go bad," Jimmy whispered. But ou was relaxed, that was why ou could _feel_ instead of keeping it all bottled up, or was that because of Jimmy?

Everybody was staring at ou and ou realized that ou was standing, arms stiff and fingers curled. Each turn of ou's head sent a trail of light dragging through the periphery of ou's vision, reminding Castiel of how ou used to be able to see the world. But now ou's grace was only a dull ache, phantom and almost useless, and ou sat back down carefully.

"Just close your eyes," said Jimmy. Warmth was coiling in ou's stomach and groin like a mockery of heaven's love, and ou was so tired. Ou closed ou's eyes.

 

**10 August 2011**

"You're in no state to go out hunting, Cas." Dean's voice was angry, but he couldn't keep the pity out of his eyes. 

"I'm still stronger than a human," Castiel said, drawing ouself up with care. 

"But that's about it." The words were deliberately cold. "Listen to me, Cas. You have to accept that you're fallen—" 

"Falling," shouted Castiel, and then ou was falling, lunging at Dean. 

Dean's sharpened reflexes had his pistol up and firing before either of them realized, the gunshot sending Castiel's sword flying out of ou's hand. 

"Cas," Dean started, but Castiel stayed crouched on the floor and wouldn't look up. 

"If I put it away, I won't be able to summon it back." Ou's eyes stayed on the sword lying a few feet away from the door. Dean opened his mouth, and with the experience of a lifetime sidestepped the issue. 

"I won't be able to let you leave the camp unless you have a gun." When Castiel finally looked at him, he shrugged. "It's the rule now, and everybody has to follow it. That includes you." 

Castiel got to ou's feet, dusting off ou's knees and straightening ou's grimy trench coat. Reseating ouself on his bed, ou picked up the bowl ou had thrown aside and repacked it with fingers not quite deft enough before relighting it. 

"Stop telling people I'm an angel. They'll just be disappointed," ou said, smoke billowing out of ou's mouth with every syllable. 

Then ou closed ou's eyes and didn't open them again until Dean left, slamming the door behind him. 

**2 September 2011**

Being confined to the camp left Castiel—Cas to everybody now—with a lot of free time. Ou explored all the cabins that hadn't been claimed yet, one per day to spread it out. Then ou spent some time learning how to do inventory with Chuck, who had been assigned to it because he was a lousy shot. Eventually Chuck shooed ou away, made nervous by Cas standing over him all the time. 

Ou found ouself drawn to the camp boundaries no matter how hard ou tried to stay away, the surrounding forest wild in a way that made ou feel at home. Soon it became a familiar sight to see Cas standing at one checkpoint or another, eyes unnervingly bright and sword sticking out of one of the trench coat's pockets. Ou usually ended up at Laura's gate, the one closest to the creek hidden behind the trees, sitting on the ground with ou's legs folded beneath ou like somebody waiting for communion. On a good day ou was just there, waiting quietly for something long gone. The rest of the week ou'd try to call it to ou by pulling out a joint or five from one of ou's pockets—how many of those do you even have, she would ask, the answer a shrug every time—and stretching out in the dirt, ou's Enochian chants not quite loud enough to make Laura tell ou to shut up. 

This time, though, Laura waved a hand at ou, unholstering her pistol with the other. "I'm going to need backup," she muttered into the walkie-talkie on her shoulder, and then Cas saw it. 

It was wearing a woman from the city, one that looked like somebody's mother, and had put a bloody grin on her face. The demon flickered, moved with a superhuman speed that made Cas's heart hurt, and Laura was gone. Cas got to ou's feet, hands pushing on ou's knees for balance. There was a sound of something shattering, but whether it was branches or bone Cas couldn't tell, and ou reached for his sword. The crashing noise came again, to ou's left, and ou tensed, remembering the month of being confined— 

"Get down!" 

Cas ducked. The bullet ruffled ou's hair, hit the demon in the shoulder (when had it gotten so close?) and knocked it away. 

The demon struggled to get to its feet but then Cas was upon it, hand pressed to the vessel's head. For a moment they stared at each other, then the demon's lips twisted into a smirk. 

"Can't do it, can you?" 

Cas held its gaze a second longer, then dropped ou's eyes. 

" _Exorcizamus te_ ," ou began and the rest came easy, spilling out guttural and hoarse. When the screaming stopped and the vessel dropped limp—she had already been dead, a shame—Mark approached, rifle ready, and waved when Cas looked up at him. 

"Dude, are you high?" Mark laughed. "Pop something to cancel it out first next time, okay?" 

Cas didn't answer, took the offered hand and pulled himself to ou's feet. Mark's palm was dry against ou's own, lifeline deep and easy to read. The man would die in the next two days. 

**3 September 2011**

The closeness of the fight left Cas tense and jittery, unwilling to venture far from his cabin without ou's sword firmly in hand. Dean noticed but didn't say anything, because if he was going to keep this band together he couldn't afford to keep playing favorites; there were already a few people who didn't take him seriously thanks to the way he not-very-subtly hovered over Cas these days. 

Early in the morning, Jimmy was more fidgety than usual, nudging for attention. "Cas? Cas." 

"What." Cas didn't stop eating, fork scraping against the cheap aluminum tray. Nobody at the camp knew how to make large-scale edible meals yet, but the main complex's kitchen still had a large store of prepackaged food, and Dean sent out a scout every now and then to see if there were any "fucking chefs or something" who wanted to join them. 

"Yesterday got to both of us, right? I can't keep doing this, not like—I mean, this is the first time I've really been there for that kind of thing." 

Cas had been trying to learn by example and push it down (how do humans do it, ou wondered) but Jimmy's worn-thin voice made the muscles in ou's neck—their neck—go tense again. 

"And what would you suggest we do?" Ou stabbed the shredded remains of lumpy hash browns, pushed the tray away from ou. 

"There's this book, I read it because of Amelia being a journalism major and she said it was good," Jimmy was babbling but there was no way now for Cas to shut him up so he just kept going. "It was about these Marines in Iraq, the invasion, and there's some stuff in there about how they would, uh, you know, to destress." 

Cas sighed and put ou's head in ou's hands, fingers laced together. "No, I don't know." Their back hurt, ou's eyes were sore, and his skin was dry and itchy and too tight. Ou didn't have time for this, and neither did Jimmy. 

"Masturbate, okay? Jack off." The words came sharp and angry into ou's head, and ou couldn't help flinching. "You've got my body for keeps now, fucking use it." 

"I don't think that's a good idea." Cas stood, straightened ou's back. It was hard to maintain a good posture when controlling ou's body was now something that required thought and attention, attention ou didn't have as Jimmy hit ou with a memory of a lazy Tuesday afternoon. Amelia was naked, sunlit and smiling, reaching out to pull him back down on the bed, only his hands were wrong wrong wrong and _Look what you've done_. 

  

**4 September 2011**

Just before midnight, Cas walked out of Mark's cabin with ou's sword in one hand and the man's stash of marijuana in the other. Masturbation having proved more difficult than it was worth, with two minds trying to control one tired body, ou had approached Mark and was invited in with a wide grin. Sex instead of masturbation seemed more appealing because something about it as a sacrament, a union, still spoke to the angel and Jimmy agreed to a transaction in spite of his kneejerk revulsion when Mark unzipped his pants. A body was a body. It had been a long time since anybody laid hands on them. 

Nobody would think that Mark had been murdered. There was no stab mark, no burnt-out eyes, no visible wound. His bones were unbroken. Someone would have to carve him open to discover the burst heart. 

Jimmy could not control his body but still found himself shaking. In the narrow white expanse of his mind where Castiel kept him, he could feel the angel's wrath blazing cold just like the time he had tried to spare his daughter this life. Mark wouldn't stop needling the angel about Dean, insinuating that Dean gave ou preferential treatment out of friendship or something more— 

“I didn't kill him. He had a weak heart,” Cas muttered. 

“You knew he was going to die! You knew what you were doing. You know what you're doing,” Jimmy said, but it wasn't an accusation so much as it was a plea. The air was slightly chilly, breath smoking out warm through their lips, and the moon high above them almost half full and a cold reminder of the world left behind. Saying nothing, Cas returned to their cabin in silence. 

**2 November 2011**

"Sometimes I think it's a shame, when I get feelin' better when I'm feelin' no pain," Jimmy mumbled. 

"Be quiet," said Cas as ou looked around, trying to see into the dark. At night the forest was almost impenetrable, and the demons knew it. Dean had changed his mind and let Cas help guard the camp perimeter as part of a not-so-secret plan with Chuck to keep ou sober. It worked, most of the time. 

"Stop that." Jimmy did, briefly, then picked up on a different line, humming it nervously over and over again until Cas couldn't help but hum it ouself as the demons started to creep out with familiar faces. 

"Sometimes I think it's a sin, when I feel like I'm winnin' when I'm losin' again." 

**16 November 2011**

"Hit her," Jimmy whispered, hot and sharp. "Spank her." The words stuttered out and Cas obliged, raising their hand then bringing it down like an automaton. 

"Like that?" The question was mumbled aloud and Jimmy was barely paying attention, so it was Beth who answered with a flat "Oh yeah, you're amazing." 

It's repetitive, ou observed, but not entirely pointless. Ou was familiar with the act, in form and theory if not in action, so it wasn't too hard to see now the importance humans placed on it. Her body was accommodating enough, but then Jimmy asked ou to turn her over, grab her tits, and ou realized that ou wasn't as detached from the process as ou'd like. 

"I'm sorry," ou said, lowering her legs. Their dick slid out with a barely audible squelch, and ou had to swallow before continuing. "I can't do this." 

She stared up at ou, pupils going wide with anger. "You—you're shitting me." 

"I'm sorry." Ou's mind kept going to Dean, what would Dean say if he knew Cas was doing this, what if he and Cas were doing this, and then both Beth and Jimmy were yelling at ou and he couldn't think anymore. 

Ou pulled himself up over her hips and pressed ou's fingers to her forehead. 

"What are you—" Beth's protest was cut off as her memories started to warp, and Cas had to strain to keep going through the white-hot headache that would never have come before. 

Ou was still straddling her, all disheveled, after a long time (too long) and then there was a trickle of something wet over his lips. She blinked up at ou in wonder as drops of blood appeared on her cheek. 

"Where—Are you okay? Your nose is bleeding." 

There was a rustling in the forest, a low growl, and Cas jerked back. There were no demons left, the last report from outside had said, which meant that this must be the Croatoan virus, even if it's too early—but then this was the timeline nobody foresaw. 

Ou lurched to ou's feet, fumbled ou's zipper closed and wiped at ou's nose, leaving a bloody smear across ou's hands and face as ou ran and did ou's best to ignore the screams. 

**21 October 2011**

It was becoming harder to tell the two of them apart. There was no more resonance to the angel's voice within his mind, just slurred words. Cas hadn't referred to ouself as an angel since Mark died, but Jimmy could not think of ou as anything else. Cas was Cas and he couldn't remember life before this. A fleeting sense of having been in love, of being loved—but painkillers and alcohol had worn holes in his memory. He didn't want his body back. Cas had kept him safe, in a way, and he knew Cas was half-crazy but that's why he wanted to be with him. 

**25 December 2011**

Downing a fourth shot, Cas announced, “Here's to the end.” 

“Most people say happy holidays, Cas, or even Merry Christmas.” said Dean, his voice thick with sarcasm. 

“If I said either of those, you would say there's nothing to be happy or merry about.” 

Dean raised an eyebrow. The dude was right, but he didn't feel like thinking about what this human fluency meant for the angel. He could recall what it looked like, seeing Cas gone native, and the way things looked now wasn't the same but it was close and getting closer all the time. Earlier in the evening, he'd shown up at Cas's cabin with a bottle of bourbon and a couple grimy shot glasses unearthed during one supply run or another. The months were beginning to blur together, murdering not-quite-humans growing monotonous. Cas, however, was still different. Sam had once tried to explain to him what “liminal” meant but he'd struggled to understand. Now, looking at the angel's tired eyes, he understood. 

“I have something to tell you, Dean.” 

He swallowed another shot. “What?” 

“It's about Sam.” 

He'd been told long ago that the angels could walk in his dreams but they couldn't read his mind, no matter perceptive as they seemed. But that didn't change the fact that sometimes Cas could be downright spooky. 

More carefully this time, Dean said, “What is it?” 

Cas looked down at ou's drink, lips pressed tight. Bringing ou's head back up, ou met Dean's wary gaze. “I told you some time ago that I was the one who raised Sam out of Hell's torment. I neglected to mention that I did it for you. Everything I did, I've done for you.” 

“Everything?” From the tone of his voice it was clear Dean did not expect a reply. He just stared for a bit, fingers tight on his dirty glass. “Can you still do that? Raise people, I mean.” 

“No.” 

“Good.” It came out harsher than he intended, but he didn't regret it. He didn't. “So what can you do?” 

Cas's expression went blank. A soft spot, the wound still leaking grace, still tender. “I can fly,” ou said, almost hesitant. 

“What about angel radio?” 

“Yes,” Cas said, blinking staccato like ou was turning a dial. “But for months now there's been only silence.” 

“And will you lose that too?” Dean pressed, reminding himself that he could not afford to play favorites. 

Cas flinched but then caught ouself. Sitting up straight ( _Be careful with my back_ , Jimmy complained, _You've been slouching too much lately_ ) ou said, words weighted not with angelic resonance but the reminder of it, “Whatever else I may lose, I will not lose you. I promise.” 

This naked sincerity was no longer a surprise to Dean yet he still found himself unsure how to reply. Unable to keep eye contact, he focused instead on pouring a new drink. Under the angel's steady gaze, he could feel his ears burning. 

**10 February 2012**

Cas watched as Dean bowed his head and opened his mouth to trace a wet hot _yes_ on the palm that belonged to Jimmy, Jimmy who was begging _no_ inside his head because that was the only place where he could be heard. Jimmy's voice had once been a pocket of silence in the global cacophony of Cas's perception, easy to miss because it was always there. Now, though, his emotions bled easily through what little was left of the angel's grace, all barriers gone, and Cas stiffened, pulled away, and vanished, leaving Dean with answers he didn't want. 

**13 May 2012**

The air was sharp with the smell of splintering wood. There were some hints of stale beer and marijuana too but mostly there was just Chuck pressed up against Dean, eyes wide and gun shaking. They held their breath and there was another scream, another thud at the door and the hastily stacked chairs rattled, windows darkening as people outside started scrabbling at the glass. 

"Where's Cas? I thought he said—" 

Dean gritted his teeth. "I don't know." He cocked his rifle, looking for a face that wasn't so familiar. 

"If I shoot now—" 

"Don't. That'll just give them a way in. Wait until I say so." Dean sat back down, floor cold even through his jeans, and leaned against the overturned couch. Chuck exhaled, the sound somehow inappropriately loud in their cramped space, and slid down too, fingers still white against the handle of his gun. 

A flash of light made them both look up but it was just daylight from outside, gone now as the mass surged forward again. Then a yell went up—Dean tensed, raised his rifle—and the windows started rattling, quietly at first then like they were going to shatter any minute— 

"Is that," Chuck started, cutting himself off when the door banged open and sent the makeshift barricade flying apart in a whirlwind of metal and wood with Cas in the center, coat in tatters and angel sword dripping with blood. 

"Dean. We're surrounded." 

"Good to see you too, Cas." Dean fired over the angel's shoulder, hitting a guy in the middle of the forehead and spraying Cas with a new layer of gore. "We're getting out of here." 

Chuck moaned at the sight but took aim at another attacker that was lunging at Cas with superhuman speed—the shot went wide, the angle was wrong—when Cas turned, sword moving so fast it made the air ring, and took down a row of people and left them with jagged holes where their necks and heads had been. 

"Get behind me." Cas spread ou's arms wide as the next wave of people ( _monsters_ , Dean finally thought) surged forward. Ou spun again and rammed the sword through a woman's jaw and was pulling at it, trying to get it back, when suddenly there were hands on ou and there was no more time— 

**13 May 2012**

—The crack of wingbeats, one, two, cut short. They appeared on the shore of a river not as far away as Cas would have liked but it's far enough for the time being because suddenly ou found ouself staggering with Chuck and Dean barely able to hold ou up, ou's inhuman weight taking them down with ou. 

"Let go," ou managed to say, dropping to ou's knees. Dean and Chuck exchanged a look but backed off under the pretense of checking each other for injuries. 

Cas stayed like that for a long while, hands and knees sticky with blood and earth, staring out across the water. When Dean walked over ou shook ou's head. 

"Not now." It was Jimmy speaking but Cas agreed, so the words came out and Dean stayed where he was, frustration writ across his face. 

"I don't know if I can do this any more, Cas," Jimmy was trying to say. But Cas was only half listening, probing the hole where ou's grace had been. Through the silence Jimmy kept talking as Cas stood, walked to where the dirt ended and the sand began, and picked ou's way down the rocks into the water. 

"Are you even listening to me? Cas!" Frustrated, Jimmy lashed out with a burst of images—the same collection he always used when he was angry, a collage of his ruined life and the angel's bad decisions—but Cas just dragged a bloody hand across ou's forehead and shook ou's head again. 

Ou's reply to him had always been the same and so ou said nothing, let the river be an answer. 

The current was strong, pulling them down. After a long while Jimmy began pleading and ou could hear Dean and Chuck shouting, faint over the roar of the water, so ou surfaced with a little reluctance. The only thing they had left was each other, and if Dean decided it was time to go out in a blaze of glory, win or lose, so be it. 

Cas walked slowly towards the land, blinking water out of ou's blurred vision. Though the mess was mostly gone, slow and steady drip of ou's nosebleed aside, ou felt no cleaner than before. The torn, stained trench coat was wet and heavy, weighing ou down, so ou took it off two years early and left it on the shore. 

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading. kudos and comments mean a lot to me, so i'd appreciate it very much if you can leave something.


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